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If you look at any of the competitors, none of them are any more open than Sailfish is. Android comes with proprietary Google applications, yes you can argue that you can run or fork Android without them, but the same way you can use Sailfish without the closed UI part.

Can you run Sailfish apps without the closed UI part? If not, then it's not the same. Android (AOSP) does not come with any proprietary Google applications - proprietary applications are bundled by the phone manufacturer. You can download the complete source for AOSP, compile it, put it on your phone, and run only open source applications (if that is what you want). Can you do the same thing with Sailfish? Likewise, you can download the complete sources for UbuntuTouch, compile it, put it on your phone, and run everything. It's all open source - even the Canonical apps.

A closed source UI on top of an open source kernel+libraries is not "more open" than an open source UI on top of an open source kernel+libraries.

Is it allowed to redistribute modified versions of Sailfish? Is the license GPL compatible? Can you distribute Sailfish and bundled GPL apps? You won't be able to if Sailfish apps link to a proprietary UI library. It's not free.

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4 - open development model. Android, Tizen, and to some extent Ubuntu have closed development models where only company workers get to contribute.

Clearly false. About 15% of commits to the base Android project alone come from non-Google employees. And if you consider the commits to projects that Android relies on (Webkit, Linux kernel etc.) then contributors are coming from coders everywhere.

And to claim that Ubuntu has a closed development model is just insane. The majority of Ubuntu contributors are not Canonical employees. And if you are talking about packages, then the vast majority of packages that ship in Ubuntu are imported directly from Debian. Are you going to claim that Debian has a closed development model?

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Most of Sailfish is from the Mer stack, which includes a lot of other contributors.

And most of Ubuntu is from Debian, which includes a lot of other contributors. But that is not what I asked - I asked how many commits to the actual Sailfish project come from outside contributors? Not other projects that Sailfish incorporates, but the actual Sailfish project. Saying that Sailfish has many external contributors because it incorporates other open source projects is like saying that OS X has many external contributors because it does the same.

If you're going to argue that Android development is closed because the majority of commits to the core project come from internal contributors, and ignore the fact that it incorporates other open source projects that have many external contributors, then you can't turn around and argue that Sailfish development is open because it incorporates other open source projects that have many external contributors.

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The UI will not stay closed. Part of it has already been opened and rest will follow. And yes, AFAIK you can run Sailfish apps without the closed UI.

Android (AOSP) does not come with any proprietary Google applications

Yes it does. Google Play, Google Maps, Chrome - all closed source.

You can download the complete source for AOSP, compile it, put it on your phone, and run only open source applications

But then you don't get to call it "Android", and you don't get Google Play, Maps, etc.

Google Play is the official package manager for Android. It's not a very open system where the package manager is proprietary and implements DRM.

A closed source UI on top of an open source kernel+libraries is not "more open" than an open source UI on top of an open source kernel+libraries.

Is it allowed to redistribute modified versions of Sailfish? Is the license GPL compatible? Can you distribute Sailfish and bundled GPL apps? You won't be able to if Sailfish apps link to a proprietary UI library. It's not free.

Again... the UI will be open sourced. Continuing to ignore this fact will only make you look stupid. The entire rest of Sailfish is open source (various licenses), only part of the UI is closed (for now), and it will be allowed to redistribute, fork, modify etc. Sailfish, just like any open source software.

Clearly false. About 15% of commits to the base Android project alone come from non-Google employees. And if you consider the commits to projects that Android relies on (Webkit, Linux kernel etc.) then contributors are coming from coders everywhere.

I don't think you understand. From Wikipedia:

"The Open Handset Alliance develops the changes to the Linux kernel, in public, with source code publicly available at all times. The rest of Android is developed in private by Google, with source code released publicly when a new version is released."

Android is developed in secret, by Google, and source code only released with releases of the OS. It doesn't use any of the usual Linux software stack, such as glibc, GNU userland tools, even the shell is from NetBSD. It's entirely non-standard.

By contrast, both Tizen and Sailfish are glibc-based, use systemd, standard userland tools, and Wayland. Sailfish has an open development model, where core parts of the OS are developed in a meritocracy, by community, anyone can join in the development. It's all done in the open. Only the UI (which is roughly equivalent to a Desktop Environment) is being developed in secret by Jolla for now, which is understandable because they haven't released their first phone yet - they probably just want to prevent a competitor plagiarizing them and undercutting their efforts. Which is an understandable concern for a small startup with limited legal resources. The UI will be opened fully though.

And to claim that Ubuntu has a closed development model is just insane.

Which is why I specified "to an extent". Which is true, as parts of Ubuntu are developed in secret, under a closed development model. For example, look at what they did with Mir, developed in secret for six months. And they do have other skunkworks projects as well.

And most of Ubuntu is from Debian, which includes a lot of other contributors. But that is not what I asked - I asked how many commits to the actual Sailfish project come from outside contributors? Not other projects that Sailfish incorporates, but the actual Sailfish project. Saying that Sailfish has many external contributors because it incorporates other open source projects is like saying that OS X has many external contributors because it does the same.

Now you're just being silly. You're using circular logic. If you define "Sailfish" as "only the parts that are not from other contributors" then of course there are no other contributors! You can't frame the argument in that way, because it would be pointless.

Mer is the core system of Sailfish. It's maintained in large part by Jolla, but there are many other contributors. Sailfish also depends on other technologies: Qt, Wayland, libhybris, systemd. There are no hard limits of what is "actual Sailfish" because that's how open source works, projects overlap and reuse the same code - that's one of the benefits of open source.

How many non-Google people contribute on Surfaceflinger? How many non-Android systems use Bionic? How many non-Ubuntu systems use Mir? Sailfish uses technologies that are being developed by the community, for the community, and contributes in upstream development, instead of NIH'ing every step of the way.

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Google apps, including Play, are not part of the Android Open Source Project. You can ship an Android device without licensing the Google apps.

"Android" is a trademark. You can apply for permission to use when your device passes the Android Compatibility test suite. Of course you can't use someone else's trademark without permission, the same is true elsewhere.

Play is not a package manager, it is a frontend. The actual package manager is open source. How do you think distributions like Cyanogenmod work? They don't ship Play.

Google develops some features in a private branch to stop manufacturers from shipping pre-release versions of Android (like they did with Android 3). It's not a secret. But everything else is developed in the stable and experimental branches, which are public, and anyone can checkout. See http://source.android.com/faqs.html#...ware-developed

But then you don't get to call it "Android", and you don't get Google Play, Maps, etc.
Google Play is the official package manager for Android. It's not a very open system where the package manager is proprietary and implements DRM.

If you want app store, you have to give some kind of protection. Not saying open source apps are bad, but you spend much more time polishing your app when it feeds you.
Still you can install it all on non-official builds and there is other app stores/maps. apks install just fine without gplay, it is rather a convenient way to find/update apps.

Mer is the core system of Sailfish. It's maintained in large part by Jolla, but there are many other contributors. Sailfish also depends on other technologies: Qt, Wayland, libhybris, systemd. There are no hard limits of what is "actual Sailfish" because that's how open source works, projects overlap and reuse the same code - that's one of the benefits of open source.
How many non-Google people contribute on Surfaceflinger? How many non-Android systems use Bionic? How many non-Ubuntu systems use Mir? Sailfish uses technologies that are being developed by the community, for the community, and contributes in upstream development, instead of NIH'ing every step of the way.

If community means Redhat, sure... their NIH init with binary logs and Wayland which is coming soon (tm)... keep waiting, just give it like 5 more years, no wonder canonical started Mir. Same with btrfs, which keeps adding features, but still fails in a spectacular ways sometimes. Qt has Digia & co behind it. Hybris is a layer to reuse android stuff you don't like, because they don't have their own and whole point of bionic was to create small and fast libc for mobile cpus without "standard" bloat.

Tizen (with Samsung behind it) can get some market share, but Sailfish won't get too far.

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Yet it is still closed. I don't see how anyone is going to license Sailfish from Jolla if everything is open. There already was that openmoko thing. Just not going to happen.

You're arguing from a position of ignorance. Why does anyone license Android? To get rights to use the Android trademark (and Google's proprietary apps). It's the same with Sailfish.

Keeping the UI closed at this point isn't in any way different to what Google has done in the past with Android. You couldn't get the source of Android v3 for a long time, even after its release. You couldn't get its source before they had released devices with it.

Jolla has promised to fully open the UI, and there's no reason to assume them to be lying. Especially when parts of it have already been opened. If they still won't do it after the release date, then start complaining. Until that it's just pointless speculation.

If you want app store, you have to give some kind of protection. Not saying open source apps are bad, but you spend much more time polishing your app when it feeds you.
Still you can install it all on non-official builds and there is other app stores/maps. apks install just fine without gplay, it is rather a convenient way to find/update apps.

Bull shit. DRM is nothing but a user-hostile feature and a strategy that never works in the long run. The very point of DRM is to fight against the user and treat the user as an adversary.

It's also funny that we're talking about an open source OS, which is at this point the most succesful OS in the world, and you still trot out the same, tired old excuse how "developers need to be fed" when talking about DRM. If Android has shown anything, it's that it's possible to be financially succesful with open source. Red Hat, Intel, etc. have shown the same. DRM is entirely unnecessary, you can make money with software without DRM.

If community means Redhat, sure... their NIH init with binary logs and Wayland which is coming soon (tm)... keep waiting, just give it like 5 more years, no wonder canonical started Mir.

I don't really care about systemd, it's an init system among others. No one forces you to use it if you don't like it.

As for Wayland... are you terminally clueless, or have you been living in a subterranean barrel buried under a rock for the last year or two? The last 5 years have been spent doing all the groundwork, polishing the lower-level graphics stack in shape, to make everything ready for a modern display protocol. This has been the hardest work, done by Wayland developers to make a better system possible - and also mostly invisble to users, because the groundwork doesn't give any flashy updates with dazzling wobbly effects - however, it's only because of all this groundwork and plumbing that me-too projects like Mir are even possible in the first place.

Canonical sure as hell didn't put in the effort to make that happen - they sat on their assess, didn't contribute a single line to Wayland development, just watched as the Wayland devs did all the hard work - then when it's time for the final stretch (which is where Wayland is now: toolkit & DE support, final tweaks) THEN they suddenly turn coat and say "we're doing our own thing now", after everyone else has paved the way nicely for them. Then they get to claim how they're doing things "faster" by tricks like putting their DE over Xmir, just so they can see "look, we're deploying our display server already". It's all smoke and mirrors.

Same with btrfs, which keeps adding features, but still fails in a spectacular ways sometimes.

I don't even know what Btrfs has to do with this discussion, but I personally have been running a Btrfs system for over half a year now with no problems whatsoever. It fails sometimes? Well DUH, it's a new FS, it's expected to have issues. Still, failing sometimes is not exclusive to Btrfs, even Ext4 experienced a bug that caused some real-life data loss only this year... and it doesn't even have the excuse of being new, like Btrfs.

Qt has Digia & co behind it. Hybris is a layer to reuse android stuff you don't like, because they don't have their own and whole point of bionic was to create small and fast libc for mobile cpus without "standard" bloat.

Hybris is a layer that's used by Tizen, Sailfish and Ubuntu Phone. It's a necessary thing in order to be able to use Android drivers, because most mobile manufacturers only release proprietary Android drivers, and good luck trying to convince them to offer open-source drivers, or drivers that work for other systems. Some don't even allow the drivers to be downloaded for free by anyone other than hardware vendors. So without Hybris, there's simply no way that any smaller startup could bring their new platform on market. Maybe later it will be possible to use non-Android drivers or even open drivers, but right now libhybris is a necessity.

Glibc is entirely fine for mobile hardware. Mobile CPUs these days are as fast as desktop computers were 5-10 years ago or so. They can have same amounts of RAM as well. There's no reason why glibc wouldn't work, and also, by using a glibc-based system, you can easily port ordinary Linux software to the system, which isn't as easy on Android.

Tizen (with Samsung behind it) can get some market share, but Sailfish won't get too far.

That's just speculation on your part. And clearly, judging from the rest of your post, you're not basing your assessment on clear understanding of all the facts.

Sailfish has already sold out their preorders, which is 50 000 phones. Now they're bringing another Finland-exclusive preorder possibility. I personally won't be buying it because I have no use for a €400 phone, being a poor student and all, but if they later release a cheaper model I'll definitely get one.

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Google apps, including Play, are not part of the Android Open Source Project. You can ship an Android device without licensing the Google apps.

"Android" is a trademark. You can apply for permission to use when your device passes the Android Compatibility test suite. Of course you can't use someone else's trademark without permission, the same is true elsewhere.

Play is not a package manager, it is a frontend. The actual package manager is open source. How do you think distributions like Cyanogenmod work? They don't ship Play.

Google develops some features in a private branch to stop manufacturers from shipping pre-release versions of Android (like they did with Android 3). It's not a secret. But everything else is developed in the stable and experimental branches, which are public, and anyone can checkout. See http://source.android.com/faqs.html#...ware-developed

You can ship without Google apps, but then it won't be an Android(TM) device. Play may also be a frontend, but it is still part of what you need to get the Android(TM) experience, what people expect from an Android(TM) phone.

Right, Google develops some features in private. Can you get the source for these features before release? No, you can't. It's the same with Sailfish UI. They're witholding the source before the release, while the rest of the OS is open source.

Amazon Kindle is not a non-Android project. It still uses Android, just not Android(TM). If that's the only example you can think of, that's not very good. In contrast, glibc is used by pretty much every Linux distro in existence, and Wayland is going to be used by pretty much every regular desktop Linux DE (except Unity), in addition to both Tizen and Wayland. They're both also developed with an open development model, in a way that benefits multiple OS's (even competing ones), not just one OS like Android.

As for Alien Dalvik being closed source... tbh, I don't really care even if it is, but do you have a source for that claim?